We need more aircraft-friendly contracts.

[Frostiken]

There's no reason to unlock aircraft-related stuff if there's nothing aircraft-related to do Even the 'visual surveys of Kerbin' contracts kind of don't work when they're requiring you to observe one part at 20km+.

[MacroNova]

I agree wholeheartedly. Lower altitude survey contracts would be a great use of early aircraft but I haven't seen any yet.

What I sometimes do is slap some parachutes onto a small plane so I can land and do surface reports, but this feels like a totally contrived solution to me, both for how to do the contract and how to use early planes.

[Wanderfound]

I agree wholeheartedly. Lower altitude survey contracts would be a great use of early aircraft but I haven't seen any yet.

What I sometimes do is slap some parachutes onto a small plane so I can land and do surface reports, but this feels like a totally contrived solution to me, both for how to do the contract and how to use early planes.

Changing some of the early tourism contracts to "fly passenger X over location Y below Z metres" wouldn't hurt. It might be a handy way to introduce the existence of the Easter Eggs, too; send 'em to the Pyramids or something.

I'm still wishing for aerial firefighting (AKA waterbombing) contracts.

[Terwin]

I agree wholeheartedly. Lower altitude survey contracts would be a great use of early aircraft but I haven't seen any yet.

What I sometimes do is slap some parachutes onto a small plane so I can land and do surface reports, but this feels like a totally contrived solution to me, both for how to do the contract and how to use early planes.

I have found that with the new 1.0 aero, I no longer need parachutes for a majority of my landings.

Just fly low with your engines turned off and angle up more if you start to get below ~50m while still faster than ~50m/s

It seems to work well if I am below 2km and turn the engines off ~ 10km from my target, usually starting to land from below 5km at 20km from my target

(I did however need chutes to land on the side of a mountain, then I had to increase the braking force of my wheels form 20 to the max of 30 to keep from sliding back down with the brakes on...)

[AlphaAsh]

I'm working on some contracts using Contract Configurator that require use of planes to transport kerbals to various bases in KerbinSide.

[SickSix]

I thought it was silly that i was completing distance records in rockets! Jets should have to be used for distance records. And yes with the new aero they should have rebalanced visual survey contacts (specifically altitude requirements).

[Kerbart]

I'm not in favor of that. I came to KSP for the rockets (Kerbal Space Program).

I have Kerbal Alarm Clock to deal with far away destinations in space. Flying two hours to somewhere across the globe... No thank you.

[Madrias]

I wouldn't mind some aircraft-friendly contracts, myself. KSP is kinda more Kerbal Flight Simulator in my setup, but I do still try to put things in space on occasion.

As always, if you don't want aircraft contracts, just don't take 'em. I personally don't take anything related to asteroids because I don't feel I'm having fun trying to shove asteroids into orbit around Kerbin or accelerate them to solar escape velocity.

[AlphaAsh]

...I have Kerbal Alarm Clock to deal with far away destinations in space. Flying two hours to somewhere across the globe... No thank you.

Two hours? Er, no. Go sub-orbital or even orbital, drop down to your destination. Planes includes spaceplanes.

[Stealth2668]

I agree. Even the survey mission that you do on the ground are always too far to make planes a viable option.

[WOODY01]

I am not sure if I am just getting lucky with how contracts are generated but I am getting a lot of contracts that can be accomplished with planes. The longest it has taken me, not including design, is around an 30-40 minutes and a lot of that time is me goofing around seeing how high and fast the design can go.

I am also finding planes very useful with the atmosphere test of parts at certain altitude and speed. Just easier for me since with rockets it seems you get one shot at it. No a big deal if you revert but plaaying without reverting planes are very useful in saving some money since you can have more than 1-2 opportunites to complete the contract.

I have currently three designs for surveys on Kerbin.

1. Uses drop pods for locations in rough terrain or I just do not feel like landing and can take readings up to aroound 12K.

2. One is designed to land on rough terrain and can take readings up to around 13K.

3. The other is a jet/rocket hybrid using the 1st teir jets and second tier intakes. It is desingned for test for higher altitudes and can reach around 30K.

I am currently working on a newer design using the ram intakes and 1st tier jet. It seems I can get to around 15K on the jets alone and I will be adding a rocket motor to boost that altitude soon.

I am still working on designing a stable test platform plane, seems I have to redesign based on contracts. I am thinking of a larger plane able to carry multiple parts to test and use fuel tanks to balance based on the payload.

[Frostiken]

I am not sure if I am just getting lucky with how contracts are generated but I am getting a lot of contracts that can be accomplished with planes. The longest it has taken me, not including design, is around an 30-40 minutes and a lot of that time is me goofing around seeing how high and fast the design can go.

I am also finding planes very useful with the atmosphere test of parts at certain altitude and speed. Just easier for me since with rockets it seems you get one shot at it. No a big deal if you revert but plaaying without reverting planes are very useful in saving some money since you can have more than 1-2 opportunites to complete the contract.

I have currently three designs for surveys on Kerbin.

1. Uses drop pods for locations in rough terrain or I just do not feel like landing and can take readings up to aroound 12K.

2. One is designed to land on rough terrain and can take readings up to around 13K.

3. The other is a jet/rocket hybrid using the 1st teir jets and second tier intakes. It is desingned for test for higher altitudes and can reach around 30K.

I am currently working on a newer design using the ram intakes and 1st tier jet. It seems I can get to around 15K on the jets alone and I will be adding a rocket motor to boost that altitude soon.

I am still working on designing a stable test platform plane, seems I have to redesign based on contracts. I am thinking of a larger plane able to carry multiple parts to test and use fuel tanks to balance based on the payload.

I've had maybe two or three that could be done with planes. The problem is:

1) The vast majority of site survey contracts are going to stick at least one node at super-high altitude, which is far too high for early aircraft.

2) As you get more reputation and more difficult contracts, the distances move out, and flying for ages in a plane is kind of dull.

3) That's basically the only contract you can do with aircraft.

Plane-based contracts that require you to fly around, land somewhere, drop someone off, fly back, or hit specific targets or whatever would be nice. Especially since the Tech Tree has been made much less imbecilic with regards to aircraft, it makes early planes more viable. Unfortunately without contracts, there's little point.

[zarakon]

I'm betting that the typical 18-20km altitude requirements on the Kerbin survey missions are leftover from pre-1.0 when it was relatively easy to fly that high on basic jets.

I've still managed to do a couple of those, but I had to put a rocket booster on my plane to give it the push from 10km to 20km, and was only good for one survey before needing a refuel.